Link building plays a significant part in how high your website ranks in the search engines. There are a variety of different ways to get links back to your website, but one of the most effective methods is to step away from the computer and out in to your community.

1) Sponsor an Event. Nearly every city or town has a few popular events that happen every year – music festivals, 5k runs, county fairs and restaurant weeks. What better opportunity to get your name in front of a big chunk of the local population? Check to see if any of these events have websites and if so, whether or not they link to their sponsors. If you find an event that makes sense for your business to sponsor and it seems like they will link to your website, go for it.

2) Be a Speaker. If you have a special talent for public speaking, you may have some great link building opportunities. Investigate your options to speak at local and national conferences and events. Finding knowledgeable, charismatic orators can be a challenge, so jumping on board with a relevant conference will usually be a mutually beneficial relationship. Bonus points if you can get a gig speaking at a college or university; their .edu URL holds extra authority and link juice.

3) Host Your Own Networking Event. Everyone loves free food and good company, but not everyone likes to play host. Put together a small (or large, if you’re feeling ambitious) networking event and hold it at your office or a more spacious venue. You could invite local artists to display their work, plan to have a guest speaker or maybe offer some kind of door prize or raffle. Whatever you choose, you need to give the attendees a reason to show up. Once you have decided the logistics of the event, use social media to spread the news. Write a post for your blog, Tweet your Followers and update your Facebook Fans; hopefully, those who follow you will begin to re-purpose your content and alert their followers about the event as well. The goal is to not just throw a great party, but get a nice amount of back links in the process.

These are just a few ways to get started with link building in your community. Don’t be afraid to get out there and network in person – you never know what kind of back link you might be able to secure!

In part one, we shared some of the effective ways to build a content strategy that encompasses your blog, social media profiles, and email newsletters. This week we’re going to take it to the next level. The goal of your content should be to generate leads for your insurance agency. How do you use content to achieve this? Here are some effective insurance marketing tips:

Tip #1. Provide an Incentive to Fill Out the Form. Few tactics work better than actually providing an incentive to fill out your lead gen form. This incentive can come from any number of places. Perhaps you turn it into a fundraising effort. Pick a local nonprofit and say you’ll donate $5 for every person who’s interested in insurance and fills out a form to get a free quote on your site. It’s important to use blogging to get the message out and then to drive traffic to the blog post through email blasts and social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

Tip #2. Create a Whitepaper with a Landing Page. If you really want to get more leads from your site, consider creating a valuable whitepaper that would be of interest to your prospects. Next, create a landing page that contains a lead gen form that visitors would need to fill out in order to access the whitepaper. When you blog about the whitepaper or link to the whitepaper through social media channels or email, you’ll link to the landing page. When thinking about whitepaper topics, ask yourself: What are the most common questions our customers ask about insurance? Or consider writing about the top five ways to save money when buying insurance.

Tip #3. Drive Traffic to your Blog. What good is all that content without visitors who are actually reading it? Make sure you link to each blog post through Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, etc. Also, consider bookmarking your blog posts on StumpleUpon, Reddit, Digg, Delicious, and Blink List.

The last thing you need to do is make sure you measure the effectiveness of your content strategy. Look at engagement metrics such as entrances, page views, bounce rate, and average time on page. But don’t skimp over looking at goal completions and traffic sources as well, to get a good take on what’s working.

A few weeks ago, I covered 15 different movies that you could incorporate into your blog posts in order to make them much more interesting and shareable. Why should the fun end at the movies? There are tons of television series that can also be thrown into your insurance marketing strategy mix!

If your readers are able to relate to the content that you are writing, you are sure to hit home. Bonus points if you can add a touch of comedy to your post!

Here are ten television series that deserve to be blogged about:

So, are you convinced that insurance and pop culture can actually work in harmony? The next time you watch an episode of your favorite television series, start taking notes! Chances are, you will have an awesome blog post by the end of the half hour.

As always, share your ideas in the comment section!

We have all heard that content is king and while this is true, there are other things to keep in mind while blogging. Of course you want to write a blog that is interesting and relevant to your readers, but you also need to make sure you spread the word to as many people as possible. What good is a well written blog if no one reads it?
For as many times as we have heard someone preach about the importance of a blog’s content we have also heard that the content needs to be “SEO friendly”. All of this is true but there are other things you can do to optimize on your blogging efforts.

Here a number of things which are just as helpful for driving traffic to the site that you may not have heard about yet:
1. Using email to promote your blog

If you have an email list why not use it for your blog? Email is a very effective channel of communication that should not be forgotten about. Sending a brief preview of your blog in an email or company newsletter with a link to “read more” will boost readership of your blog and traffic to your site. You could also include a link to your blog in your signature or reference your blog when addressing a specific question from a client or potential customer. With Social Media being the hot topic everyone is talking about it is easy to forget about email, but you shouldn’t.

2. Announcing your blog on Facebook and twitter

Like I said, social media is all the craze these days- and it can be used to broadcast your blog to a larger audience. By posting a link and a short enticing message about your blog on your social media pages you will be sure to drive more people to your blog. There is also an opportunity for people to share your content through their own accounts and help your content “go viral”. In this day in age the challenge is not deciding whether or not your company will use social media but instead how well you will use it.

3. Taking advantage of social sharing sites

In addition to sharing your blogs on your own social profiles you should consider taking advantage of social sharing sites such as StumbleUpon, Tumblr, and Reddit. These sites provide great channels for sharing your content but this requires some additional work. Each site has their own set of rules and formats for posting so you must make sure you play by those rules. If you want to receive the benefits of these online communities you must become a respectful member of the communities.

So the next time you publish a blog remember these tips and tools for optimizing your efforts. First you must write a blog with great content and then you must make sure that content gets the attention it deserves. Good luck and happy blogging!

By now your agency mostly likely has a blog, social media profiles, and hopefully an email newsletter set up. The question is: Are you using these channels to communicate compelling information that your prospects find useful or interesting? (Useful and interesting enough to fill out a form on your site?) To answer this question, you first need to define your content strategy.

In part one of this blog series, we’ll talk about how to set up a content strategy. In part two we’ll discuss how to take your content strategy to the next level.

5 Steps to a Successful Content Strategy:

1. Define your business goals and objectives – Perhaps your goal is to increase the number of leads coming in through your website, perhaps it’s to accumulate a local following of blog readers in hopes that they will eventually convert.

2. Evaluate your customers – Analyze your current client base. Who are they? Look at demographics. The content strategy you create will have their interests in mind.

3. Brainstorm ideas for content that will compel visitors to take action or return to your site – Your goal should be to become a one-stop resource for local community information, advice about insurance, including ways to cut insurance costs, and useful tips for preventing accidents from happening. Resist the urge to tout all the benefits of buying insurance from your agency. Sales-y language won’t keep them coming back to your blog or social media profiles.

4. Add value – Create a whitepaper, video, or a fun contest to keep visitors engaged while also providing value. You can create a whole campaign around one of these ideas. For example: if you create a whitepaper, try promoting it with an article on your blog, then drive traffic to the blog post via social media channels and email.

5. Measure – Last, but not least, it’s important to measure the impact of your content strategy. Look at how much traffic you were able to drive to your blog, how much time people spent on the page, and whether or not they filled out the form. Measuring is the most important aspect of all insurance marketing strategies because it helps you figure out what’s working and what’s not.

One last tip when thinking about content: Keep it light – Insurance can be a complicated topic. When creating content, especially for your blog and emails, think about disseminating information in small, digestible chunks. Think of it in terms of “Top 5” ways to reduce your car insurance premium… or “Top 5” ways to mitigate risk, etc. More tips like this coming up in part two!

With so many different social media outlets to choose from these days, do you ever wonder how you can possibly reach your core audience? It is important to focus on the basic tools first, such as Facebook and Twitter, because this is where most of your customers will be having conversations. By understanding the interests of your audience and their needs, you can begin to build a strong social media influence.

The following are tips you can use in order to create and maintain your social authority:

• Be Disciplined – Your motivation to communicate with your customers will show you are dedicated to serving them. In addition, the way you behave or are perceived by others is very important in building a strong social media influence.
• Try to Gain Trust- Trust from your community is extremely important. If people don’t trust you and what you have to offer, then you will not have an authoritative social influence.
• Be Consistent- Establishing yourself in your specific field, being insurance, will allow you to create a good social media influence. Also, staying true to your voice and the topics you want to discuss will allow others to see the value in your business.
• Stretch Yourself for Excellence: Being determined to do more and reach excellence will challenge your company as well as inspire your customers. Showing you care and want to support the community will result in success and people becoming influenced by your work.
• Be Natural- Never try to be someone you are not, both on and offline. Your audience will be able to see right through your fakeness. So instead, be natural by creating your own voice in order to express yourself fully. This will bring consistency to your platforms.
• Promote Others – A true leader is a one whose followers try to replicate him/her. Therefore, becoming a great social influencer entails promoting others with all the experience you have gained over the years.

The main goal of insurance social networking involves interacting with your clients on a humane and honest level. Sharing your views, listening to what your customers have to say, and expanding your knowledge will help strengthen the conversations. In addition, remaining open to your community will make them feel comfortable so they can see the value in your social media influence!

Many business owners know that sending out press releases is a great and cost-effective way to create brand awareness and get their name out there. However, a press release is only effective if it is properly written. If you’re considering writing press releases as part of your business’ insurance marketing strategies, consider these writing tips:

• Make sure the information is newsworthy and it is clear how the information contained in the release will be beneficial to readers.
• Start with the actual news announcement and then identify your company as the entity that is making the statement.
• Make sure that the first 10 words of the release are especially effective because you will only have a short amount of time to grab a journalist’s or reader’s attention.
• Avoid overly promotional language and stick to the facts.
• Provide as much contact information as possible, including your individual contact information and the company’s address, phone, fax, email and website. If an inquiry comes in, you do not want to turn the person away by being unreachable.

If press release writing is one of your insurance marketing strategies, it is essential to understand the basics before you start trying to brand and pitch to news sources. Once this foundation is strong, your company can start optimizing releases to build a stronger Web presence.

Are you thinking of creative ways to boost your insurance agencies internet marketing strategy? One word to live by- Twitter! Twitter is a popular social media site that allows you to build a community and is one of the best ways to get your brain stirring with creative blog topic ideas.

Twitter isn’t going to write a blog for you, but it will give you relevant and interesting ideas to start the brainstorming process.

The top 5 ways to get creative with Twitter:

When engaging your reader things you will want to remember when writing is, keep the information informative yet interesting and make sure your information is relevant for the times. Twitter keeps these things always in mind as is updated with information every second.

Along with these ways to gain ideas you will be able to pull relevant and credible links from twitter. People usually post information and then add a link. This is a great way to add informative outside sources to your blog post! Remember as an insurance agency you want to intrigue your audience so get creative! Reading your Twitter will keep you in the know while positively affect your blogging process.

The movies are not only for the big screen- they can be just as entertaining in your blog posts! It is not always easy coming up with topics to blog about, never mind an interesting topic. However, in order to benefit from your blogging, it is important to make sure the content that you write is interesting and worth sharing. If your post does not catch the public eye, then what is the point?

As a blogger, I have found that incorporating pop culture into your insurance marketing strategy and blogging efforts will always pay off. These posts seem to get the most traction and are shared the most often! Whether you choose to blog about a hit-single, a movie or television show, you are sure to be appealing to a much larger audience than if you are blogging about a policy.

To get started, here are 15 movies that you could be comparing to your policies in your next blog post:

There are millions of films out there; it’s time to choose one of your favorites and find a way to write about it! Insurance is not always the easiest topic to relate to pop culture, but these 15 ideas prove that it is not impossible.

Have a movie in mind? Let us know about it in the comment section! We would love to hear your creative ideas!

Thinking outside the box and becoming more creative to generate leads is a great insurance marketing strategy for your insurance agency. Social media has become one of the leading ways to impact your community, generate interest, and draw in prospective clients. Whether you are heavily invested in Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn, you have got to start somewhere.

All of these social media sites provide different opportunities for your agency to brand itself on. As a leader in the insurance industry, you will want to use social media to integrate fundraising and community service into your agency. This creative and humbling Internet marketing tactic will not only bring you leads, but it will build a stronger community for your agency.

Integrating fundraising and community service into your social media strategy:

Through Facebook, you are going to be able to optimize your experience by creating interesting posts that people want to interact with. Through Twitter, you are going to be able to promote good things going on with your event or service to provide real time updates. And through LinkedIn you can update your initiative through your professional networking groups.

Being involved on a day to day basis with your Facebook friends and potential clients is a great way to generate new leads through social media. Creating a fundraiser or community service event to bring the community together, will not only benefit the non-profit or business you are donating your proceeds to, but it will benefit the community, and even better your agency. Think outside the box and bring people together through social media, and you will be guaranteed to build a larger and more beneficial community surrounding your insurance agency.